Farinelli
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Movie Reviews of Farinelli
Movie Review: Bleh...
Summary: 2 Stars
There are a lot of reviews in english. I'll write mine in spanish for spanish speaking costumers :)
Tenia altas expectativas respecto a esta película, pero quedé decepcionada. No es lo peor del mundo pero creo que pudo ser mucho mejor, me parece que la historia es subjetiva. Tiene buena calidad de audio y video, la musica es muy buena y las decoraciones tambien, pero en si es un poco aburrida. Tuve que verla en dos partes porque me quede dormida la primera vez.
Movie Review: Farinelli
Summary: 2 Stars
Two stars not because of the film itself (it is magnificent), but because of the very poor picture quality of the DVD. Scenes with slow movement (see, e.g., the last one, where he rides away into the landscape) are full with artifacts, probably due to poor coding. Btw, it is not the player, which might have problems with NTSC, other NTSC DVDs play perfectly.Movie Review: The best bits are overblown melodrama and the rest....
Summary: 1 Stars
This was in a technical sense an interesting film. As everyone would know this film is about a castratii. A singer who has had his testicles cut off before puberty to preserve a boys voice. The sort of voice which was achieved by these singers is now something of a problem and the parts are sung by women. In an attempt to reproduce the sort of sound that would have occured two singers, a man and woman have tracks morphed by a computer. The sound is fascinating. The movie however is not. The hero Farinelli apart from being one of Europes leading singers became a companion of the king of Spain in later life. He would thus have seemed to be a person of some interlect and charm.
The film however is pretty grotesque. It makes his castration the center point of the film and the basis of the entire tension and plot direction. Whilst such an operation would clearly be a bit of a shock, we would probably see it as so. For Farinelli it would not doubt be different. It was a decision which moved him from a person with no future to wealth and a place in a royal court. Of course nowdays we tend to see sexual matters as more important and the film reflects this rather modern attitude with the theme being his sense of loss and betrayal. It is his brother who has drugged and castrated him at a young age and then makes a living off him by managing him.
Despite a modern view of things being cast back on a far different time, the film is quite grotesque. Thus Farinelli's brother uses him to get girls "in the mood" and as they lie in bed sexually excited he comes in to finish the job his brother cannot do. Again something which is the creation of the film director to explain the co-dependance of the brothers and the shame and hostility of Farinelli.
In general the film is a dissapointment. The portrayal of the characters such as Handel is absurd. The tensions and drama within the film are contrived. The singing is however good. But over all weird, and dissapointing.